Received Wednesday, October 25, 2006
This morning, (10/24 at 9:30 a.m.) while I was waiting in the checkout line at the Target store on Everett Mall Way, I noticed a very young woman (maybe 17-19 years old) in front of me-she had blonde or light brown hair and was very slim, wearing jeans. In the cart she was pushing sat a sweet, pudgy-faced little girl who looked to be about 10-13 months old, and had a dark complexion and curly black hair.The nanny was buying a plastic bib, and nothing else.
The child was happy, and smiling, but had a HORRIBLE cough - she sounded awful!
I commented to the nanny on how cute the little girl was, and she mentioned it was her first day watching the child. I also offered the suggestion that sitting in a nice warm bath with the child might help clear up that cough! (Can't help it-my husband keeps telling me not to offer unsolicited advice-guess it's something I need to work on!) The nanny smiled and said they might try it.
The child looked quite comfortable with her new caretaker, who wasn't being overly playful with her charge, but was obviously doing her best on that busy morning in the crowded store. This nanny was smiling, happy, and looked glad to be with your daughter.
If this is your child & your new nanny, congrats! You've found a keeper!
The first day on a caregiver's job -- a caregiver you claim to not even know -- and you're declaring her a "keeper" to whomever may have hired her?
ReplyDeleteAre you by any chance that caregiver? Or the mother of the caregiver, relieved that your daughter has a job?
Unreal.
I hate to agree with the first comment person, but I thought the same thing. There seems to be pressure to allow sightings of good nannies. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm...
ReplyDeleteI agree. This sounds very much like someone's mom trying to put in a good word for her daughter.
ReplyDeleteBut take a deep breath, Mom. Any employer who leaves a nanny with a sick child alone on the first day and trusts her to drive the kid all about the town- well they aren't much going to care about the quality of care.
I find it troubling at best that anyone would endorse a caregiver this heartily after witnessing the caregiver for all of five minutes in a line at a Target store.
ReplyDeleteYou guys need to lighten up! There is such a thing as a good nanny and I'm sure it's not always, if at all, the nanny or nanny's mother boasting about themselves/ daughter.
ReplyDeleteI think it's very interesting the way the line of comments is going. I couldn't tell you one way or another if this is a real posting or not, but I've often thought how easily someone could sabatoge another nanny's career on this site. It's something we should all bear in mind. Anonymous postings definitely serve a great purpose, but everything on the internet, including this site, should be taken with a huge heaping truckload of salt.
ReplyDeleteStill, this brief sighting hardly indicates that this is a keeper of a nanny. Just a person doing what they're supposed to be doing.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with anonymous 7:30. You guys talk about endorsing a caregiver in all of five minutes, well how about making judgements on their "lack of nanny skills" in all of five minutes? That is pretty heavy stuff. You could be costing someone a job. That is heavy.
ReplyDeleteCosting someone a job? If you read about your nanny SPEEDING through intersections on this blog- then as a parent your job is to LOOK in to it. Get real, 90 percent of employers of bad nannies know they don't have good nannies on their hands. They just don't care.
ReplyDeleteum. I think its kinda messed up to suggest to a perfect stranger to sit in a bath with a child. That reads creepy to me.
ReplyDeleteSeriously? Im sure if you could read correctly she probably meant PUT THE CHILD IN A WARM BATH!! Not for the nanny to climb in there with the child...
ReplyDeleteugh!
Not exactly a pack of rocket scientists chiming in on this particular posting today, is there?
ReplyDeleteYep, I agree anony. 4:28pm
ReplyDeleteHonestly guys, you take this too seriously. Based on the ammount of people in the world vs. the ammount of nannies and the chance of someone even catching something about their nanny on this blog, I think the chances are extremely slim. The website obviously isn't that known! So do you really think that it's beneficial for a nanny to write a positive post about themselves and just cross their fingers that their employer reads them?? Common! I am a nanny myself and I never realized that this side of the nanny world existed. I am very amused by your stories though so keep them coming. I also want to say that choosing a nanny is kind of hit or miss, you can never tell how they are going to act with your younger children (whom can not speak) when you aren't around so if this is the type of childcare you choose then these are the chances you take. No I'm not verbally/physically abusive to my "charge" (this word is another story) I am just realistic! Get a life people.
ReplyDeleteJust my 2 cents but as a mom, that's exactly why I would not consider leaving my baby alone with a stranger before he could even talk. And I've said it before, but if your "career" doesn't enable you to personally care for your own child during the first 2 years of their life, it ain't no career, it's just a crappy job and you should re-examine your priorities. Or use birth control. That goes for both mom and dad.
ReplyDeleteWow, people who want jobs outside of their homes before their children are two years old should re-examine their priorities or use birth control?!?
ReplyDeleteI hope that no one judges you for your choices in life the way you seem to judge others, "parental responsibilities".
I am responding to Parental Responsibilities ......... who are you to tell working parents what is best for them? I am the Mom of 12year old triplets (yes triplets) one, two, three. I have had the same nanny with me for 8 of those years. She is not only nanny but a family member as well. Her twin sister cared for my girls the first few years of their lives. I have something called mother's instinct and I knew immediately that I had quality. My nanny is healthy, happy, well-spoken and educated. I pay her well and ensure tht she has time to go to school. What works for you clearly won't work for us working moms who don't only have jobs but careers. It is not all of us who opt to be a stay at home mom. My children ar happy, my husband is happy and I am happy
ReplyDeleteI am the original poster. In response to the initial responder (9:17pm), yes, I DO believe that you can learn a lot about how a person (nanny in this case) feels about his or her job within the first 5 minutes of speaking to her and watching her interactions with a child. As the mother of a special-needs toddler, I have interviewed literally dozens of people for nanny, therapist, babysitter and caregiver positions for my child...and have only hired TWO of those people. When interviewing, their credentials and references weigh very heavily, but my first impression/gut feeling is what will ultimately get the person hired, as long as their references check out, of course. People are generally relaxed and are not 'on their best behavior' when they think no one important, like their boss, might be watching them. Therefore, a chat in a checkout line can be very revealing. You can bet that if this young woman was already frustrated with her job or the child or her new boss, or felt uneasy or stressed or whatever, she probably wouldn't have seemed calm and attentive at that time. I also am an educator (Elementary/Special Education) and taught preschool and lead infant classrooms in corporate childcare centers for 9 years before having my son. In that time, I have cared for literally hundreds of children for 10+ hours per day while their parents worked. With this experience, I'm often able to tell whether a child is scared, uncomfortable or stressed...trust me, I saw stressed-out, abused and neglected children A LOT during my career. I've also come to learn how a very young child acts when she/is is afraid of or doesn't feel secure with a caregiver. I'm not a clinical expert or anything, but it seemed pretty clear to me that the child I observed was comfortable with her provider, especially since it was apparently their first day together. To me, that speaks pretty highly of how well the woman was able to care for the child's needs and hlep her feel safe. (How many of you have a toddler who would've been fully happy and content when left with a brand-new person for the first time? I know mine would've looked pretty upset if he felt nervous or scared of his new caregiver!) Gut feelings are all we have to go one here, and in this case, I felt like mine were probably pretty reliable, at least reliable enough to share my pleasant experience with this nanny on this website.
ReplyDeleteMy reason for posting was simply this:
If I was that child's Mommy, and had just hired a new caregiver for my sick baby, (actually, when my son is sick, I stay home with him, but I realize that perhaps that wasn't realistic for that mom on that particular day, or maybe the child just had allergies or something) I would certainly appreciate hearing that at least one person from the public noticed my new nanny seemingly doing a good job with my child.
That's it. No more, no less. As far as being a 'keeper' well, any parent who would base their decision to keep/dismiss their nanny based on one anonymous posting needs to re-evaluate their standards! But perhaps I should've used a less specific phrase, like "It looked to me like your nanny might have been doing a good job, but I'm not really sure..." So I apologize for any verbage confusion my use of the adjective 'keeper' may have caused.
The purpose of this site is for folks who've witnessed a nanny/caregiver on the job to have a spot to put their observations for the parent's reference, and hopefully the parent might notice the posting. Obviously, anything posted on the site needs to be taken with a grain (or 2, or 3 grains) of salt.
And to the person who thought I'd actually tell someone she should get IN THE TUB with the child?? Obviously, I meant to SIT IN THE BATHROOM with the child while the child takes a bath, and let the steam from the tub help clear the child's lungs. This is a common, non-invasive practice to help stuffy noses and coughs without medicating the child.
I am neither a caregiver/nanny nor a mother, but a step mother of a young mother.
ReplyDeleteThis forum originally caught my interest because I have been considering a nanny for my step grandaughter so she could go back to school and work without having to fret.
My career is very demanding and more often than not, I find myself either on the road or spending 12 hour days at work. Unfortunately I do not have the time luxury to be a stay at home Grandma.
Admittedly, this forum has answered a lot of questions because as a woman who has many girlfriends who have entrusted thier children to my care I am very hesitant about trusting my step daughter's children with strangers.
This forum does demonstrate a lot about human nature and how criticizing and deaming people can be both as employers and as nannies.
I have read through a lot of the blog strings and have seen criticisms about grammer, words that annoyed people, distasteful descriptive words regarding attire and the nannies that wear the clothing.
There are a few voices of reason and logic but it's disheartening and scarey for someone that has been considering an alternative method of child care for a solution for a young mother that is also struggling herself who desperately wants to improve herself for a better life, better health insurance, and a better education for her child.
I've read bitter angry nanny comments, criticizing comments from mothers about trivial matters, etc.
As a prospective employer, I wondered what has been expected of the nannies, what are the typical pay scales, background checks, etc.
So I decided to peruse this forum to see what types of abuse have been seen and what concerns are out there.
I could not imagine expecting a nanny to clean the house when the children are the ones I have employed them to take care of, that's what a house cleaner is for. To add salt to the wound, pay them minimum wage? It's no wonder.
There have been degrading comments about nannies but so many (thank goodness) that flew to their defense. On the flip side, derogatory comments from nannies about employers.
In the mean time, while we are so busy pontificating about proper grammatical usage and semantical errors, the point of the forum gets lost which is the concern for the safety of children and who is in charge of those children.
I have been able to glean this much from this forum. I would hesitate to ever post a warning on this site for fear that I would be horrifically lambasted or critisized when my intent was to inform people of an injustice or to provide accolades to a job well done by a nanny.
Furthermore, I have been successfully confirmed in my belief that we will just avoid the nanny solution.
We sure tend to be a very judgmental, criticizing, heartless group of beings that love to jump to conclusions.
3:51, it is a small world. One of the posts several months ago fitted the description of a family that I know. Of course I am not sure it was them, but based on the website info it could have been. One of the parents was my ex-boss, but I was no longer working for him, and I could not contact him. Plus, I knew that he would never take me or the website seriously, but still I did feel bad about it.
ReplyDeleteAnd 3:04, yes, we can be judgmental, and criticizing and heartless, but sometimes among the rubble you can find real diamonds: loving nannies, thoughtful mothers. And reporting posters may get lambasted, but somewhere down the line the life of a child and sometimes a parent and sometimes a nanny may get better on account of it.
So please keep it coming.
If I saw someone I thought I recognized on here but could not talk to the parent, I would use the "email this" feature and send them an email. I'd send it to the mother from the father or vice versa. That just saddens me that you may have recognized someone and you stopped short of alerting the parents. There are ways to alert people without getting involved. Write a note, slip it under their door or in their mailbox. Some nannies are wonderful. Most nannies are not.
ReplyDelete